Bicycling, in addition to providing an alternate form of transportation for many, continues to be a popular recreational and sporting activity. Weather permitting, bicyclists can often be seen riding about at almost any time of day and at all times of year. As bikepaths are not always provided, bicyclists often resort to traveling along roads and public highways also utilized by motor vehicles. Unfortunately, even absent reckless behavior by any party, the crowding of motor vehicles and bicycles on the same roads occasionally spawns collisions between the two, with injuries or fatalities resulting. Typically, collisions result because the motorist did not observe the bicyclist until too late to avoid a collision. Or, when passing a bicyclist, a motorist simply misjudged the clearance between the bicycle and the vehicle and sideswiped the bicycle.
In order to decrease the probability of collisions between bicycles and motor vehicles, bicyclists utilize a number of safety devices to make their presence more visible to motorists. For instance, during daytime operations, an assortment of different safety devices which display flags can be mounted on bicycles. Representative devices employ brightly colored flags disposed on either upright support rods or horizontally extending support rods. While effective during the day, these types of safety devices offer minimal or no increased bicyclist visibility during nighttime bicycling.
Other bicycle safety devices provide features intended to increase visibility of bicyclists during nighttime, or more likely dawn or dusk, operation. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,972,302, 3,982,771, 4,321,883, 4,483,586, 4,575,189, and 4,586,454 all disclose bicycle safety devices wherein reflectors are mounted on horizontally extending members. These devices are designed to ideally serve two functions. The horizontal extension attempts to persuade motorists to allow sufficient clearance between the bicycle and vehicle when passing so as to not sideswipe and topple the bicyclist, and the reflector is an attempt to provide increased visibility. However, the shortcoming of these devices results from the very nature of reflectors. Without incident light, reflectors supply no visibility advantages to the bicyclist. Therefore, on dark nights in areas without house or street lights, motorists only become aware of the presence of a bicyclist when their vehicle headlight beams are first incident upon the bicycle and the safety device reflector. As a result, especially when a vehicle is turning or is traveling along a curved section of road, the headlight beams may not strike the reflector until the motor vehicle has nearly overtaken the bicyclist. On such occasions, the horizontal extension is of slight value; the motorist has little time to appreciate the significance of the extension as she is already taking swift and necessary measures to simply avoid a direct impact with the bicycle. Of course, the unexpected appearance of a bicyclist in the path of a vehicle does not always result in a disastrous collision. Evasive maneuvers taken by a motorist usually avert such an impact. However, these nerve-wracking maneuvers are unsettling and potentially dangerous to all involved as well as innocent bystanders and other vehicles. Because reflectors have visibility shortcomings which do not eliminate the need to conduct such maneuvers, reflector type safety devices are inadequate.
In alternate attempts to address bicycle visibility problems during nighttime operation, lighted safety devices have been mounted to bicycles. These lights are extremely desirable as they are almost always visible to motorists at greater distances than reflectors. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,274,127, 4,309,741 and 4,598,339 all disclose bicycle safety devices with vertically disposed lights, mounted to upright poles, which extend above the head of a bicyclist. While these safety devices make the actual presence of a bicyclist more noticeable to motorists, they are all deficient in their failure to provide means to dissuade a motorist from passing too close. At night, a motorist closing on a bicyclist will likely first recognize that bicyclist at a later point than if it were daylight. Therefore, a safety device having means for a motorist driving at night to quickly and better gauge how much to veer to avoid sideswiping the bicyclist is all the more important.
Another shortcoming of existing lighted bicycle safety devices is their complex light switch designs which command increased engineering and manufacturing costs. For instance, many lighted safety devices use light switches which require exactly positioned metal contact points, thereby necessitating precise assembly and expensive fabrication. Other designs, due to the spatial relationship between the light switch and the power source or light bulb, require large quantities of wiring and soldering. The need to pass on to the consumer the increased costs of manufacture results in fewer sales. In addition to reducing profits, fewer sales translates to fewer bicycles outfitted with the safety device. Consequently, some collisions which could have been averted if the safety device were implemented nonetheless occur, resulting in avoidable injury.
Furthermore, some safety device light switches currently existing in the prior art, due to their ease of activation which is part results from their high manufacturing costs, are subject to being accidentally turned on by casual contact. As accidental light activation drains valuable battery-power,it is highly undesirable. Moreover, if at dusk and when away from home a bicyclist first discovers the light was accidentally turned on during the day and has exhausted the electrical power source, the bicyclist must continue without the protection afforded by a lighted bicycle safety device and risk injury.
Still another shortcoming of some existing lighted bicycle safety devices pertains to the location of the power source relative to the light. Because the extending poles do not hold the power source, the power source is located distant from the light, and occasionally independently mounted on the bicycle. As a result, besides requiring extra costly wiring as well as increasing the difficulty of installing the device on a bicycle, the device must be wired to the bicycle itself which is undesirable.